Today we will hear the story of Jesus changing water into wine. Don’t you just love the amount he made! What a party!

So……this afternoon we had planned to have a party at the afternoon praise service for families at St A’s. Our CW who does the most amazing sugar craft has made a beautiful birthday cake for her granddaughters 18th. Unfortunately, her party has been cancelled so instead of being grumpy about the wasted effort (it took months to make the intricate flowers) the CW has transformed the cake into a wedding cake for us. Lots of children will come to the service so instead of serving wine we were going to make weird and wonderful fruit cocktails. Hence the name of the service Cocktail Praise. We were also going to watch that wonderful exuberant wedding entrance dance that has had nearly 40million hits on youtube. The prayers had the response, ‘Stir and shake us up into the people you want us to be’

And then there was Haiti, the mood for celebrating has been shaken and I am sitting here wondering how I should change the service . We can’t ignore what is going on in the world. Folks who sink into despair and apathy, folks who shrug their shoulders and say ‘what can we do?’ will not be the ones to transform this hurting world.

I have decided not to change too much in the service. It is important to celebrate our God who loves us abundantly, to celebrate that spirit of extravagance. I take my lead from David in the psalms, “I will bless the Lord” We choose to worship. We will bless the Lord in good times and in bad.

We will say the ‘stir and shake us prayer’ too, even though it might sound a bit insensitive. The story of the changing water into wine show us that we do have enough, we have all the resources we need to transform this world. Jesus asked the servants to help him and he used what they brought. And because they did what he said, things happened.

So I am thinking about what we can bring this afternoon, poor as it might seem, in faith that Jesus will transform it extravagantly. The CW suggests an offering plate. It’s a start.